lhunt

Well, partly, I guess, because you are pushing yourself around to pivot a bit in the seat. But you are also actually pushing the boat. Your paddle pushes you, and you push the boat, partly through your butt, partly through your feet. Of course, if you're like me, you're also trying not to push yourself ineffectually back into the seat backband, which is a complete waste of energy and is hard on both feet and backband. Yes, if you are used to fitness paddling it becomes easier to paddle at a "normal" touring/club pace, and yes, if you have a good stroke you probably do that without using your arms much. As you say, even if you aren't using your arms to push the boat, you still have to hold the paddle. The faster you go, the harder your arm muscles have to work to transmit work from torso to paddle. Actually, sometimes it's my hands and wrists that suffer the most, probably because being female there is just less there to start with. But I remember as I first started getting the stroke a little better, it seemed to me that just maintaining the new stroke was quite difficult. It uses different muscles (abs, and whatever it is that holds your arms high and the paddle way out in front of you). I actually found it harder to keep it up (at a slower speed) than my "old" stroke. I remember thinking "well, maybe that's a better stroke, but I can't imagine doing that for more than a couple of miles!". But muscles can be trained, it turns out. So getting the stroke right helps, but doing hard paddle workouts helps, too. So I'll give a little plug for doing some fitness paddling on the side, even if you can only find time to go to a local river, as is often the case for me. The training gives you a nice focus for physical fitness in general - you push yourself hard and it feels good. You get a nice strong core and lose weight while doing what you love. You reduce the chances of repetitive injury by getting stronger. When winter comes and there is only a gym to fall back on, you always have your kayaking goals to work toward. It makes it more interesting. Then as a nice fringe benefit, on group paddles you can sit back and enjoy the scenery. I'd much rather spend my exercise time racing my own time to the North Bridge and back on the Concord River than doing 1-1/2 hours on the Stairmaster (!) I just realized how off-topic this is. Oh, well. -Lisa

Um, yes, like Michael I'm NOT doing opposite side pushing :-) Actually, I never heard of that before. With regard to course correction: I have an ONNO footbar. It works the same way as footpegs, but goes all the way across. I can get a nice gentle course correction by putting both feet on one side of the boat (say the left side, to veer right) and continuing a normal stroke, maybe with a little outside lean. Like most racers, though, when racing I normally use a rudder, because the benefits of a concentrated symmetric forward stroke overcome the drag of the rudder, or so they say. And yes, it is possible to do the leg pumping thing while manipulating the rudder, you just can't lift your foot in that case.

Yes, I'd agree with both those things. The "knees up" technique as I understand it is to wind yourself toward one side (say the left), squirming in the seat so that your right hip is a bit forward and you feel like your belly button is pointing off the left side. Bending the right knee helps enhance the effect. Taking your right foot momentarily off the footpeg during the windup helps keep your feet from going numb. Then plant your paddle close to your toes on the right and unwind while pushing on the right foot (and paddling, of course). This squirms you back the other way, pulls the left hip forward, bends the left leg a little, and gives your left foot a little circulation. Needless to say the downside of knees-up paddling is the need to get your knees back under the cockpit for the roll in the event of a capsize, so it's reasonable to only do it when the bump is manageable.

Yes, thanks, Doug, for calling a great trip, and awesome pictures as usual! One thing to add to the trip report is that we were 11 in total (!) HERE's the track from the "non rockers" pod (13.9 statute miles total), and HERE are some more pix (I pasted a few from Leon in there, too).

I'd like to join you guys, too! Lisa

Me too. Have one that is 2-1/2 years old, never had any problem, even though I occasionally put sugary drinks in there. I always clean it after use, then just freeze it empty. Be careful opening - if it had some water in before freezing and the lid froze shut let it thaw rather than forcing it.

I guess what Gene is saying could also be stated: Ideally, you want the wind at your back during the long stretch from Thatcher Island to Dogbar, and on your beam between Halibut Pt. and Thatcher. It will be against you on the remaining (northern) stretch, but the unprotected portion of that stretch is shorter. On a good day you can get both the tide and the wind to cooperate in this way, sometimes clockwise, sometimes counter-clockwise. Just check the weather forecast. Note that if you end up against both tide and wind on a windy day it can become difficult to make headway in the Annisquam. The tide in the Annisquam "splits" around the 128 bridge. And one other note, in case you aren't familiar, watch out for tidal effects (and boat traffic) in the Blynman Canal under Rt. 127. Things can get "sporty" there. That's probably why Gene is suggesting slack tide. Going with the tide can be exciting but is usually doable, but against the tide you can have strong current for a short distance and sometimes nice standing waves. And an audience watching from the street. Fun! And to pass on word from the guy at the gates, never take a kayak under a raised drawbridge.

Oops, of course, 12.6 nm, 14.5 miles.

Destination: Crescent Beach... I get 14.5 miles, Ern - don't shortchange us! Track here (I had to draw in the first .2 miles by hand because I forgot to turn on the gadget). Pix here. All hail to the blueberry tart!

I'm in!

...and everybody in the race was giving thanks for a nice, gloomy (not-too-hot) day! 12 minutes, but who's counting? Preliminary results can be found here (temporarily - I'll probably take them down once the "real" results are in). Where were you guys hanging out? Nice to know there were friends about. -Lisa (the person 12 minutes behind the fair (and fast) Fiona :-)

I've taken to carrying dishwashing detergent for this very reason. I use a tiny bottle originally used for prescription eyedrops which takes almost no room in the pocket of my PFD. It's not much bigger than a good sized grape. If I forget to wash my hands after the whole sunscreen thing it's easy to do in the boat.

Here is a slightly different take on the story, with the current satellite view of the ship (apparently this time, at least, the satellite took its picture at a very low tide, too). The idea that they intentionally took it to shallow water to salvage it makes more sense to me. Otherwise why go between the islands? I was having fun imagining a crew that was looking to stop for lunch and maybe some grog. I speculate, looking at the view of the whole island, that the beach on Little Misery that we like to land on may owe its existence to the wreck. The rest of the island has a rocky shore, and the beach is suspiciously tucked in behind the wreck. Also there's no way a 274 foot ship would have sunk right where it is (half of it would be up on land), so we have been guessing it broke up and turned or drifted. I don't know about the "here" links - they work for me in Firefox but Explorer insists on downloading rather than displaying the PDFs. (I've got a new computer and am still searching for the right controls). I'm attaching the PDFs to this reply. -Lisa 100544251.pdf 117944398.pdf

Leon and I happened upon a very low tide at Little Misery yesterday, and the familiar wreck there was more visible than I can ever remember seeing. A little research on the web turned up some basic facts I never bothered with before: The "City of Rockland" was a 274 foot steamship built in 1901 in East Boston. It took passengers around Maine and apparently to Boston. It had a number of accidents early in its career (two are described here and here), but was refloated each time. It was decomissioned in 1923 and was accidentally grounded at Little Misery on its way to be sunk. It was set on fire (probably by vandals) in 1924, and burned to the waterline. Well, anyway, that's what I'm finding in cyberspace but of course no guarantees... More pictures of the wreck are here, along with some vintage pix of the vessel I found on the web (and some of the rest of our paddle!)... Anyway, I thought other NSPN'ers who are frequent visitors to the island might like to see what they have been scratching their hulls on. Lisa

Not true, Leon, sorry! I guess we should take this offline, but I don't want to leave this as is for the world (including Pam, maybe) to see :-). Pam started 2 min. ahead, being in a class with somewhat shorter boats. I caught up with her, it's true, but she never let me pass her, though I tried, tried, tried, for the better part of 2 miles. Once she saw the danger she never let it happen. Maybe she was kickin' back a bit before that, being so far in front of her class, but when she wanted the speed she just reached for it. Don't get me wrong, I'm very happy for even being able to almost keep up with Pam. I just don't want to overstate it! I know if we had matching waterlines there would be no contest. Lisa

Ah, yes, first out of a class of one. Got to get more women in the Fast Sea Kayak class! A few pictures of the pre-race and post-race festivities are HERE.

Maybe it matters how fast you are going to begin with (the sedate pace of the videos helps you see the action but I'm not sure it scales up). Also, even though the momentum changes slowly, it does change. These guys are all almost at a standstill at the end of the process, and there is still some turning to do. As Doug says, you can get back up to speed in 3 or 4 strokes, but that's a high cost in a close race. I'll play with it some more this summer. New skills are a blast, anyway! Lisa

...Mmm, maybe. I think that was sort of my point - a tighter arc saves distance but not necessarily time. (He may have also politely have swung a little wider to give me more room.) Yes, that's the best point. Any time I try to do a 180 deg. bow rudder conservatively, so as to save speed, it takes too long to get back to the forward stroke and defeats the purpose. In this case, we were both using wing paddles. If you look at the video here: you see a degree of control that I have a hard time getting with the wing paddle. (Also, I count 10 seconds for the turn on the video, plus you would need more to get around the rest of the arc and back up to speed, so it doesn't seem to be all that fast). I see that some people on the web recommend a cross bow rudder when using a wing - maybe I'll try that some day. As to the man I was racing with, I said we were evenly matched, but that isn't fair. I think his boat was less optimized for speed than mine, which would make him probably the stronger paddler.

I think Emilie was talking about being the person in the front seat of a tandem while surfing, which is, like, Wow, as far as I'm concerned. The dynamics in that situation are certainly different than racing in a single. So this is not a rebuttal to that, at all. However, when you start racing, the question is how to deal with the turn buoy. I experimented with a bow rudder and my mechanical rudder and just lean 'n sweep. I knew that the bow rudder would reduce forward momentum, but I reasoned that the tradeoff might be worth it if you're going in the wrong direction in the first place. It turns out that having to re-accelerate to speed afterward is too expensive. The other day I was racing without a rudder slightly behind a gentleman in a sea kayak when the buoy happened. He went in close to the buoy and used a bow rudder, swinging out wider after the turn. I went in wide and leaned hard to sweep on the outside, crossing through his wake and coming back in closer to the buoy. I passed him easily on the inside while he worked to get back up to speed, though we seemed to be pretty well matched otherwise. OK, there were a lot of other variables there, but it seemed to be a convincing real-world confirmation. Of course this is only one kind of turn - different strokes for different, ah, situations. -Lisa

Thanks, guys. The first Recreational K-1 was also a woman (Stephanie Kelley). And a Senior, to boot. It's a nice thought, Leon, but no supporting evidence :-) Lisa

Thanks, Leon, Anybody else running?

Way to go, guys! That's a nice solid excursion for March! Makes the rest of us sit up and start shaking off the winter blahs...

Without the additional 4 lb.?

I got a dogtag for my boat, meaning a tag actually made for a dog. The plastic ones are pretty much indestructible. I got the kind that is made to be threaded onto the collar and just ran the webbing for my seat backband through it, but of course it would be simple enough to glue it in. If you use a permanent marker, note that they are not all light fast - a garden marker like this might be best. But I guess a sticker is the only way for a black paddle (?)

It's difficult, though. Makes you appreciate the wildlife photographers. I took a couple of pictures of the seals, but they are all blurry. The seals blend in with the rocks, and it's not good for them when we scare them off. Maybe if we go there again in the spring I'll make more of an effort to rinse the lens first, then pick a side with the sun behind me, stay further away, and see what Panasonic's supposed super zoom can do (!) Thanks, Doug. I'm always inspired by yours to try harder :-)